Food Network Star – Week 3 and 4

First a quick review of last week’s competition. Last week wasn’t even worth the time to sit down and comment, that’s how bad it was. They did send the right person home, Kenny. But the whole show was a waste of time. The challenge was Cut Throat Kitchen. The judges said this was to test that the competitors could cook under pressure and adjust to the circumstances. I really would like to see how well the judges would do with some of the sabotages. It’s real easy to sit back and tell them how they could have done better.

The challengers were split into two teams. For one team the challenge was to make spaghetti and meatballs and the second team had to make a breakfast plate. I honestly don’t remember much about the results of the spaghetti and meatball challenge other than Loreal had to grind her meat with a snow cone machine. See, that’s how much interest I had in the show last week.

For the breakfast plate, Kenny didn’t have any sabotages against him and he came up with a lame breakfast in a cup idea that looked totally gross and I’m sure tasted just as bad. I’m not one of those that can’t have my food touching each other, but even I wouldn’t have tried sticking a spoon or fork in there and tried it.

Lenny was in the bottom three and I was sad to see that. Of course everyone saw him as the biggest threat and tried to deal with him first. He ended up using his entire wad of cash so he wouldn’t be sabotaged, so when the next one came out he didn’t have anything left to spend and they got him. He had to ride the blender bike and make a smoothie which really is just a time waster. He made an egg dish and a bread side, unfortunately the bread side which he called a sopapilla was more of a corn tortilla with no flavor and Bobby actually spit it out. They all said his egg dish was good but all they could focus on was the stupid tortilla. In the end Kenny went, thank god! Emma was the overall winner with chocolate covered bacon sandwiches which actually sounded pretty decent.

This week the challengers had to make a quick little selfie of the Star kitchen and give a quick tip as well as the big challenge of making a viral video. I read some comments on FN Facebook page and the FN Dish blog and the majority were in an uproar because there was no cooking. I do want to state that I understand in the overall scheme of things the purpose of this challenge. In today’s society it seems most everyone in their 30’s and down is electronically connected, like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. This is how people communicate and I understand that the Food Network is adjusting as times change. However, I still would like to see some cooking. After all in the end isn’t this what the winner is going to have to do? This week’s challenge really played into my open letter to the Food Network.

The selfies – most were ok. It is what it is, the challenger walked around the Star set and talked about whatever they wanted. It was obvious that some are very socially connected and were totally natural doing their selfie. I can’t say that any of the selfies made that big of an impression on me. Here are some of the highlights that I found noteworthy.

Emma gave a nice calm tour and ended the clip taking a bite out of a fresh tomato. She ended up winning the challenge which gave her a big advantage for the next one.

Loreal was a little out there, as usual. But she was cute and funny.

Lenny gave a decent tip about cleaning cast iron but didn’t really explain why it was necessary, something I would have liked to have known because cast iron has always been a bane to me.

It was obvious that pageant princess, Sarah, was comfortable taking pictures and talking about herself. I thought she did pretty well, but thought her tip was lame and a last minute “oh yeah I gotta do a tip” type thing.

The big challenge was to create a viral YouTube video. The challengers were split into three teams and had to create a video promoting Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups, Payday, Almond Joy and Mounds candy bars. Emma’s advantage from the last challenge was that she got to pick the three teams.

Team Payday was Christopher, Lenny and Aryen. The skit was in a lab with a big lump under a sheet and Dr. Christopher totally hidden by his wig. I honestly thought this one had the best chance at becoming a viral video. Truly Aryen and Lenny pulled it off. Christopher was in the background too much and didn’t act Dr. Frankenstein enough. He really could have played up the doctor part but didn’t. He let Aryen Igor it up to the max. Lenny was the bumbling Payday monster who really clinched it in the end. The judges couldn’t understand anything Aryen was saying, but that was the character. Igor isn’t supposed to be very intelligible. How this video ended up in the bottom I’ll never know.

Team Reece’s was Rueben, Emma and Nicole. The skit was ok, Reuben was a Spanish teacher trying to teach Nicole and Emma Spanish but I found it hard to understand Reuben and I found it somewhat off putting the way he got in Nicole’s face when she couldn’t roll her Rs enough. Emma was the perfect student and kind of just there. I guess it was enough for the judges to think it was the winning video.

Team Almond Joy/Mounds was Sarah, Chris and Loreal. I honestly have no idea what they were trying to pull off. Two girls dating candy bars and waiting to introduce them to Daddy? Chris had the biggest part and it’s exactly what he wanted. But the concept was lame and they beat out the Payday monster?

The judges were way off base this time. I’m not sure what they were looking for but the one video that would probably have gone viral was the one they chose for the bottom. Seriously, one wonders why they really chose it to be in the bottom. Was it because two of the people on the team are two that I think are the weakest and would like to see gone and the judges happen to agree so needed to have a reason to get rid of them next. But out of the three videos this one was definitely not the worst, so someone from team Almond Joy/Mounds should have actually been the one to leave. There were two on that team that I think are the weakest and will eventually get the boot. But I guess it’s too soon for them, we need to prolong the agony a bit longer.

In the end it was between Christopher and Aryen. Although Aryen was eventually going to leave I’m not sure they made the right choice by sending her home this week. Yeah, her selfie wasn’t the greatest but neither was it terrible. Chris didn’t play hardly any part in the video and his selfie was ok, but he’s just not interesting. Maybe he’ll go home next week.